At the fall of the second wicket, I read, the
Leicester captain went out on to the field " and presented the young Yorkshireman [Smithson] with his Leicestershire cap." I don't know whether any young Leicestershireman possesses a Yorkshire cap, but I agree with various writers of letters to the Press that the residence qualification is becoming a farce, and it is a great pity it should be. There is something to be said for a first-class cricketer in a second- or third-class county being given the opportunity of play- ing first-class cricket (Barnes, of Staffordshire, a Test. Match player, I believe joined Lancashire), but the mere annexation of able players with no connection with a county does not, I suggest, create a county team proper, valiantly though the non-Warwick- shire players have served Warwickshire. Professional football and professional cricket have always been very different things, and will, I hope, be kept so. The real cricketing county is the county that breeds its own brilliance.
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